Thursday, May 9, 2013

EITI : Cameroon would be compliant country by August 2013

Cameroon could gain the ‘compliant’ member status of the Extractive Industries Transparency Initiative, EITI by August 2013.
In a working session in Yaounde on Tuesday May 7, 2013, two officials from the international secretariat of EITI, Tim Bittiger and Bady Balde said given the significant strides in its last report, Cameroon could gain the ‘compliant’ country member status when the Board meets in a validation session on August 13, 2013.
The working session that brought together stakeholders in the extractive industries sector in Cameroon was co chaired the Minister of Finance, Alamine Ousmane Mey and the Minister of Mines, Industries and Technological Development, Emmanuel Bonde.
EITI officials said the meeting was intended to assess together with the visiting EITI international secretariat team, what has been done and what needs to be done to make the country’s report ready for the August session as it would be the last chance for Cameroon to attain the ‘conformity’ or ‘compliant’ country status of the EITI.
The working session took place barely a few days after Cameroon had published the 2009/2010 report on payments and revenues from the oil and mining sectors; a report that experts say is of much better quality than the previous reports.
However, the EITI Board will take a final decision on whether the country has followed the EITI rules when the validation session of the reports opens in London this summer.
The visiting EITI team from the international secretariat advised that Cameroon should speed up the publication of the 2011 report as well a recruitment of a validator before August 13, 2013.
Cameroon adhered to the EITI on March 17, 2005 and in November 2007, she was granted the candidate country status. On October 25, 2010, the EITI Board notified Cameroon of the granting her a “candidate close to compliant” status. Since then, Cameroon has been faced with the challenge of becoming a “compliant” country status of the EITI rules.
By Ndi Eugene Ndi

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